Pantheon, a London-headquartered leading global private markets investor, has kicked off a $4 billion fundraising round for its latest global infrastructure secondaries fund, drawing interest from major South Korean institutional investors.
According to sources in the investment banking industry on Monday, Pantheon is tapping the interest of Korea’s major institutional investors, such as public and pension funds, in the Pantheon Global Infrastructure Fund (PGIF) V, the new vehicle of the UK infrastructure secondaries pioneer’s flagship fund series.
A secondaries investment strategy involves buying existing stakes in private equity or other alternative funds, allowing investors to access more mature portfolios with shorter holding periods, reduced risk and often at a discount.
Pantheon, recognized as the first-mover in the infrastructure and private credit secondaries, first raised capital from Korean investors in 2014 with its $290 million PGIF II, coinciding with the opening of its Seoul office.
In January 2024, the company closed its largest-ever secondaries program, the $5.3 billion PGIF IV, which also secured commitments from Korean institutional investors, including
the country’s largest institutional investor, National Pension Service (NPS), and the
sovereign fund, Korea Investment Corp. (KIC). The firm’s PGIF II, III and IV are known to have generated internal rates of return (IRR) in the low-to-mid teens, according to people familiar with the funds.
IRR, or internal rate of return, is a metric used to gauge the profitability of potential investments.
The Pantheon’s secondaries investment fund is expected to help
Korean institutional investors diversify their investment portfolios. London-based Pantheon is a global private markets investor with 12 offices worldwide, including Seoul, managing $75 billion in discretionary assets under management (AUM) and deploying over $28 billion in transactions across private equity, infrastructure, real estate and private credit, where it has been a pioneer in secondaries.
Its Seoul office is overseen by Kim Jin-man, a partner in Pantheon’s Asian Investor Relations team, who joined from Macquarie in 2011.
He holds an MBA from London Business School and a bachelor’s in aerospace engineering from Seoul National University.
Write to Jong-Kwan Park at
pjk@hankyung.com
Sookyung Seo edited this article.
